DESTRUCTION OF BOSCOTRECASE

1906

mountain slopes had abandoned their homes and fruitful gardens to destruction and were fleeing down to a zone of safety. However, Professor Matteucci, the astronomer whose observatory is on the spur of the volcanic cone, remained at his post with his assistant, Frank Alvord Perret, of New York, and witnessed the eruptions of this and the following days. The electrical phenomena were extraordinary, and seriously interfered with the operation of the seismograph, the instrument for recording the violence, frequency, and direction of the earth tremors.

The eruption began with an overflow of lava, or molten rock. On April 6 the main stream of lava, 150 to 450 feet wide, and from 30 to 35 feet high, was pouring down the southern slope of the mountain at the rate of 21 feet a minute, shriveling by its heat even before contact the vegetation in its path. All the while there fell a shower of ashes and black sand, which, mingled with hot vapor, came down at times in the form of "caustic rain," very destructive to vegetation. The military engineers tried to dam the lava flow, but it burst through all obstructions, and, on April 7, overwhelmed Boscotrecase, a town of 10,000 inhabitants, and drove out the 30,000 of Torre dell' Annunziata.

On Sunday, the 8th, the great jagged cone within the crater was blown off in rock fragments, which fell on all sides, a number of them piercing the roof and breaking the windows of Professor Matteucci's observatory. During the day many enormous blocks of stone were cast up to the height of 2,500 feet above the crater. The ashes ascended much higher, and spread out in the shape of a huge tree, a veritable upas of death, for the destruction of life was wholly due to the droppings from its branches. Driven by the southern wind the main extension was to the north, where all the fatalities occurred, chiefly in the towns of Ottaiano and San Giuseppe, on the northeastern slope of the volcano.

1906

EARTHQUAKE IN CALIFORNIA

Falling like snow on roofs unprepared in that summer clime for the weight, these volcanic effluvia crushed houses like eggshells, killing several hundred people who had remained in their homes. When their bodies were exhumed, the postures of some of them, the arms protectingly before the face and the hands full of jewels, were counterparts of bodies dug up in Pompeii, showing that death had come from the same causes that operated in the ancient cataclasm. Five days after the eruption two families, comprising ten persons, were dug out alive from an ash-covered cave at Ottaiano. On the following day two old women were rescued from beneath the protecting rafters of a fallen roof. Several thousand houses had been destroyed in the district, and the immediate financial loss was over $10,000,000. While it will be several years before the farms and vineyards are restored, the fertility of the land will not be impaired but rather enhanced by the deluge of ashes.

By the 9th of April 150,000 refugees were gathered at Naples, where the ashes lay three feet deep in the streets. The roof of a market collapsed from the weight upon it, killing 12 persons and injuring over 100. King Edward and Queen Alexandra gave up their visit by advice of the King and Queen of Italy, who came on to Naples as soon as they heard of the eruption. Victor Emmanuel visited Ottaiano, and Queen Helena went among the refugees in Naples, encouraging the sufferers by their sympathy. Both the King and the Pope opened subscriptions for the destitute, and their example was followed in various quarters of the globe, notably in New York City, whither many Neapolitans had emigrated.

But even before the mass-meetings organized for the benefit of the Vesuvian sufferers could be held, the news of a far greater calamity in the United States thrilled the hearts of Americans as they had not been stirred since the great

THE SAN FRANCISCO FIRE

1906

fire in Chicago. Beginning at 5:15 o'clock on the morning of Wednesday, April 18, a great earthquake visited San Francisco, California, and the surrounding region, containing about twenty cities and towns. It shook down hundreds of houses in the metropolis, chiefly in the business district, and the Chinese and poorer residential quarter, where the houses were flimsily constructed and slightly founded on low and made land. Several hundred people were buried in the ruins. At Santa Rosa fifty lives were lost. The entire business portion of San Jose was wrecked with a loss of nineteen lives and $8,000,000 worth of property. In Salinas the great Spreckels beet-sugar refinery was tumbled into ruins, along with local stores and business houses. By the collapse of the Agnews Insane Asylum 117 patients and 9 officers and attendants were crushed to death. The fine Memorial Church of Stanford University was ruined, and its other buildings damaged, causing a total loss of $2,800,000. Almost all the towns in the Santa Clara, Napa, and Sonoma valleys suffered severely.

This of itself would have formed a calamity of the first rank in the annals of disaster. But at San Francisco and Santa Rosa fire followed in the wake of the earth tremor, reducing the main portions of these cities to blackened walls and cinder heaps. The earthquake not alone caused the fire by breaking gas mains, upsetting stoves, and bringing live electric wires into contact with woodwork, but it prevented the extinguishing of the flames by the unjointing of water mains. The firemen of San Francisco, aided by Government troops under General Funston, stationed at the Presidio, endeavored to confine the fires to the districts in which they started, by blowing up with dynamite rows of yet unburned houses. This was only partially successful, as the ruins of the buildings remained for the flames to seize upon and cross to the standing buildings beyond.

1906

EXODUS OF THE INHABITANTS

For nearly two days the flames, now united in one mighty conflagration, marched unchecked through the fine residential regions of Nob Hill and beyond. A last stand was made on Thursday afternoon at Van Ness Avenue, where artillery as well as dynamite was used to batter down three-quarters of a mile of stately mansions. Then providentially, on Friday morning, as the fire was throwing its crimson bridges across the barrier, the wind shifted, and the western fringe of the city was saved. The water front was protected from the returning flames by streams of water thrown by tugs and other craft, among which were two Government fireboats, hurried by Admiral McCalla from the naval station at Mare Island. This front was the most valuable asset of the city, for upon its docks and warehouses San Francisco was to depend for the early restoration of her commerce. Here also were the ferries to Oakland and other comparatively uninjured towns across the bay, whither, as soon as the fire abated through lack of fuel and the coming on of rain, the crowds of homeless people who had been lodging in the parks began to betake themselves for more comfortable shelter and an exit to other parts of the State.

It was found that every one in a position of responsibility had done his duty. The citizens, under the leadership of Mayor Schmitz, organized a committee of safety. The Mayor issued proclamations safeguarding life, property, and public health, and made his rules imperative by affixing the penalty of death for their infraction. General Funston, who had won rapid promotion in the Philippines for his ability to do extraordinary things on extraordinary occasions, again proved himself the right man for an emergency by supporting the fire and police forces of the city with the soldiers of his command, as well as putting into instant operation the machinery of the army commissariat. Provisions were hurried in from the nearest army posts even before the

PLAN FOR REBUILDING

1906

supplies, hurriedly collected by relief committees, began to pour in from neighboring cities.

The whole country had instantly comprehended the need for the most ample and ready assistance possible. President Roosevelt sent in several messages to Congress which appropriated $2,500,000. Before May 1 the various relief funds throughout the country had amounted to over $20,000,000. Foreign countries cabled their desires to contribute funds, but President Roosevelt announced that, while this country was grateful for the spirit which prompted these offerings, it was prosperous enough to care for its own.

The total loss of the fire and earthquake in California has been estimated at $300,000,000. Before the vaults in the burned banks were cool enough to be safely opened, the merchants of the devastated city were taking steps to recover this enormous loss. The fact that the modern high steelframed buildings, which many had expected would topple first in a cataclasm, were structurally uninjured by the earthquake and least affected by the flames, gave courage for the future. Sites of burned buildings were held at a greater value than that of building and site before the fire. And in connection with this outlook for a safer and richer city came one for a more beautiful one in the discovery that, as if anticipating this very emergency, an architect, Mr. Daniel H. Burnham, commissioned by a far-seeing civic organization, had prepared a complete plan of rebuilding the city.

But whether or not the disaster shall prove a blessing in disguise, one thing has been demonstrated: the American citizen, as typified in the Californian, has not yet degenerated so far from the pioneer who conquered the obstacles of desert and mountain, as to be daunted by other and thus far uncontrollable manifestations of natural energy. The courage of 1849 remains as strong as ever. It is the spirit of the Nineteenth Century-and After.